1. Field Of The Invention
This invention relates to an installation for processing photograph envelopes intended to equip a large photography processing laboratory.
2. The Prior Art
Generally, orders for photography work are given by customers to a retailer, small-businessman or employee of a department store, who places the photographs to be processed (film, disk, paper print, transparency, etc.) in a special rectangular envelope whose one side is transparent and whose other side carries various indications relative to the work to be done, and two bar codes, including a code for the retailer and an identification code for the order corresponding to this envelope.
These envelopes are placed by the retailer in boxes placed in front of the store, and specialized teams collect them each night and take them before daybreak to the processing laboratory where they are stored in bulk in the containers that were used to transport them.
Then the envelopes are sorted by hand by common final technical characteristics (for example, size of film, surface condition of paper: dull or glossy, size of paper print) to form batches.
Each of these batches is then carried to a first processing station where the films, for example, are removed from their envelopes, then glued end-to-end with simultaneous marking of each film and each envelope to obtain, on the one hand, a cassette containing the marked films, glued end-to-end, and on the other hand, a stack of empty envelopes placed in the same order as these films and marked.
This cassette and pile of associated envelopes are then carried to a second photographic processing station, for example, development of the negatives in the case considered, and so on, the stack of envelopes constantly following the corresponding photographic prints.
At the end of technical treatment, the finished prints (negatives or paper prints, for example) are replaced in the corresponding envelopes, on which are then written by hand the number of processed photographs (paper prints in the example considered) and the charge code intended for billing and depending on the photographic processing performed.
The closed envelope is then routed to the charge station where the billing is performed. It is an automatic machine comprising a keyboard on which an operator keys in the number of prints and the charge code which is read on the envelope. This keyboard is connected to a central computer which, as a function of these two latter data and of the identification bar code of the retailer which is read from the envelope placed on the machine for this purpose, the price to be billed is deduced and its automatic printing on the envelope is ordered. At this machine the bar code representing the order number is also read from the envelope, which order number is then (or only now) recorded by the central computer.
The envelopes are then routed to an automatic sorting machine, for example of the "LASER SORT" (registered trademark) to be grouped by addresses of the retailers and finally routed to them.
These traditional installations have the following drawbacks.
The envelope input sorting, which is done manually and at night, requires an increase of manpower proportional to the increase of the volume of customized options or production cycle reductions. Training of seasonal personnel has to be performed each year at the necessary periods. The sorting is performed in cascade with loss of information on the identification factor of the preceding step. It is slow, limited in its capacity, and a source of error. Any change in products, of circuits, causes errors.
Marking of the input date is not performed, which does not make it possible to have reliable, controlled information on the date received by the laboratory, and handicaps the management of deadlines.
With regard to identification of the order, a number of problems may arise.
For films with development, after input sorting and gluing, the number of batches to be produced by film size and by type of surface option, by paby size, and commercial circuit of associated envelopes by lot are known. Therefore, optionally it is possible to deduce the amount to be processed. This information is not input or associated with the client or the order number. It is not processed and is lost on the statistical level.
For flat envelopes (reprints), this information is not input in the laboratory, after end sorting without recording and without knowledge of the volume.
For the reporting studio, processing of the photography work, the envelopes are recorded with a bar-code reading device, but the type of order is not associated with the envelope number or the client's number.
Absence of the knowledge of the order book upstream from production does not make it possible to have a short-term forward-looking organization of production. Yet this knowledge is essential to know the loads and bottlenecks, to assure following of service, and to reduce costs and delays.
Billing is extremely slow, with high risks of error (it is known that statistically a keyboard input causes one error in 300), is not flexible (prevents customizing), and goes slower the more the volume increases. Input errors to the disadvantage of the laboratory are rarely recoverable.
Marking and date of output from the laboratory are not performed. The order book is known only at the moment of charging, when the product leaves the company.
The output sorting is performed at least partially on an automatic very expensive sorting machine, whose rate of use is extremely slow.